The lady vanishes...

When I heard that a lollipop lady had vanished from UNISON's Labour Conference delegation I was of course deeply concerned that a vigorous approach to collective responsibility and internal union discipline might have got out of hand.

It turns out that this is just an amusing gimmick to promote our Million Voices for Change campaign.

The progressive aspirations which inform our campaign are essentially the same as the objectives of the TUC-supported Peoples Charter.

Not every UNISON branch can afford to produce an ice-sculpture to catch the attention of jaded delegates at a political Conference - but we can all buy a pasting table and get out petitioning at a weekend or outside workplaces (or for that matter inside workplaces).

The Charter could be a valuable tool to build UNISON's campaign as well as demonstrating - across the breadth of our movement and beyond - the popular support for socialist politics which fails to find a voice from the leadership of any of the major parties.

I hope that this is the direction in which the campaign can now be taken. After all, Miss Froy was quite capable of acting alone - as UNISON is - but she still sought allies from those travelling in the same direction.